Legacy Character: A Story in Two Parts
by Pterobat
Summary: Years after the Zentraedi have departed Fantoma, an elderly Exedore Formo finds that life still holds many strange things.
1. Chapter 1

**Legacy Character: A Story in Two Parts**

**Part 1: Longer Now Than It Seems**

"The Zentraedi ships re-entered the atmosphere at around 3:49 Tiresian Time. Zentraedi official Jenral Malta had this request to make."

Jenral, a female, became the primary image on screen, as the transmitter swung to her.

"The news that we have is of no concern to Tirol at large. Know only that my people have recently averted a monumental crisis, and we are only here to speak to Venerable Exedore Formo, on a matter of deeply personal importance to him."

The interviewer: "But you can't blame the rest of us for being intrigued. It's been a long time since your people were in this area."

"I can tell you no more yet, since we must return to Nuadull as soon as possible. But perhaps Venerable Exedore can share the information with you when our meeting is finished."

She stated where the Zentraedi delegation planned to land, and I waited before turning off the machine, since they would have to get permission from the local government to do so.

In my peripheral vision I saw Lantas standing in the room with her ink-stained hands, having emerged from her studio to watch the broadcast.

She stayed to watch. When an update came, there was no time to be wasted.

I levered myself slowly out of my chair, taking my walking stick in one hand. I tried to push my body into greater urgency, but as it sometimes did, it refused to listen, locking me into a hatefully slow pace.

Still, in most moods I counted myself as fortunate. The same engineering that had once allowed my people to be warriors all through their lives made it so that, while notably aged, I was hardly senile and helpless.

I wore a soft dark green garment, but my instinct for protocol lead me first to don what I took on for the rare ceremonial appearance: a long-sleeved black robe, over which went an open-fronted dark red one, whose back rose into an hard angled collar, similar in shape to the top of a Zentraedi emblem. Its sleeves where wide and trailing, and tipped in yellow and black.

Lantas changed out of her inside clothes as well, into a dark blue dress with a puffed, translucent green shirt underneath, secured at the wrists with golden cuffs which matched the one about her neck.

As we prepared to leave the house, she hooked her arm in mine and I walked close to her, but she was my consort and not my nurse, and I tried to never forget my independence, or hers.

Then she drove us to the site, still not speaking. The moment was too subtly intense for that.

----

Together we stood in the field. Once this had been a place reserved for the Zentraedi to come down from Fantoma for a while and recall what fresh air felt like, but after the Zentraedi had become confident enough in their numbers to settle on the world they had found, the great fence had been torn down and the land made use of, although there was still a considerable amount of open territory.

The sunlight beat down upon the collar of my robe. I leaned upon my walking stick, which was still largely decorative. It had been one of the many gifts left to me when the Zentraedi had abandoned Fantoma. From their perspective, it was an astonishingly delicate piece of work, even though it was undecorated and otherwise standard. I treasured it.

The ground shook slightly as three Zentraedi approached. Jenral Malta was a dark-skinned female with bobbed black hair, wearing a uniform with long pants and short sleeves, with the upper body covering ending in a kilt-like extension. A long cape was secured at her chest, forming a triangle there.

A fully armed and armoured female soldier was at her side. In her gauntleted hands she carried a circle of metal with small objects upon it; from my vantage I could not see it accurately.

The third person in the party was a male, and wore a smock-like covering vaguely reminiscent of the Macross-era Zentraedi uniforms. If fashions hadn't changed too much, he was likely a physician.

"Greetings, Venerable Exedore. I am Jenral Malta. These are Staldral Trem, soldier, and Ophicuron Oigul, physician."

All of the giants descended slowly to one knee, Staldral putting her platform aside to do so.

Jenral continued. "There is business that we need to conduct inside the ship. We will operate according to your needs, and answer any questions you might have."

"Very well. I am ready to go whenever you deem it fit."

"So am I," Lantas added, as if to make sure they did not forget her.

"If you would please get onto the platform."

There was no need for further formalities; that at least had not changed. Zentraedi tended not to see the need for floods of honorifics and greetings before getting to actual matters.

The platform was a piece of metal crudely beaten into a circular shape. Welded onto it were a pair of Micronian-sized chairs with their long seats stacked with padding and blankets. I was able to move on my own without pain, but the chairs seemed welcoming, and I entered and settled into mine. Lantas only stayed upright beside my seat, holding on to it for balance in preparation for being lifted up.

Staldral gripped the platform and rose to her feet extremely slowly, before beginning to walk towards the shuttle at equal speed.

Apparently the fashion of Zentraedi space structures still favoured metallic, geometric contours over the twisted, pseudo-organoid façades of old. We were taken to a small meeting room, and the platform was set down upon its table.

The briefing was swift and clear. When I understood it all, my only outward reaction was a slight clenching of my hands on the blankets.

"Do you want to see him?" Jenral asked.

"I do. Please take me to him immediately."

The platform was picked up again and taken to another room. One half of it was bare but for a cable spool that our platform was placed on, leaving enough room for Staldral to put down what she explained was a portable audio amplifier.

In the other half of the room there sat their subject on a bench, cuffed hands limp between his legs, body bound to the wall by a belt, rope, and staple.

They told me he had been long-stripped of his imitation uniform and cowl and given this prison garb, which resembled like the blue jerkins once given to the Micronized, only the prison suit was dark green, with pants beneath the kilt and long sleeves, and came equipped with soft slipperlike shoes.

But right now, the outfit warranted less than a second of observation. What was more important were its _contents_.

His name was Anoris Formo. He had been synthesized from my cloning template. His hair was cut as mine had been in the ancient times, and though the right half of his face had a drooping, melted look, including a lopsided brow ridge which obscured the eye, it was still "my" face, before surgical modification and aging had reshaped it.

Seeing him for truly, I could not stop myself. My mouth hung open, and a thin, choking noise emerged from my open throat. Distantly, I heard Lantas make a much harsher sound of disgust.

These Zentraedi were not the ones who had done it. My cloning template had been stolen and given to the Survivalists, a group of Zentraedi who had wished to live out the ancient ways, sexually segregated and camped on a distant territory, making their own food and doing nothing but playing at war, because they felt it helped them live clearer, simpler lives.

But some had come under the thrall of a male called Temron Kravshera, and gradually turned themselves into an attack force, marching to the single city-state of Blen and intending to coerce the rest of the Zentraedi people into joining a new kind of army. Anoris had helped the Survivalists form their plan of attack, though he himself had remained sequestered at their base, to participate when the new machine began in earnest.

Temron's forces had been defeated after a lengthy battle on Nuadull, and when the Survivalist camp was being cannibalized in the aftermath, Anoris had been found.

"Do you know who I am?"

"You are my progenitor," the clone replied.

I was feeling unusually weak. "I know that you are a product of the Survivalists. Have you been told what these Zentraedi now want with you?"

"Yes. I am to become an archivist for the Bleninan Zentraedi."

"And what is your opinion on the matter?"

"As I understand it, I live only by their...mercy, I believe the term is. Therefore, I must do what my new superiors tell me."

"The world must be quite strange to you."

None had to tell me that Anoris had been brought here only for the purpose of informing me of his existence, and that I ought just to be saying good-bye and letting these Zentraedi go back to rebuilding their world. I was not expected to teach or interact with him in any way.

Yet still I felt somehow anchored to the area; it felt as thought this business could not be so easily concluded.

He took a while to speak again. "Temron gave me some understanding of your history; I am for instance aware of the Great Alteration."

The Great Alternation was what the Zentraedi had eventually begun calling our cultural transition, began during the First Robotech War, though such things were a never-ending process. "And how did you react to news of such an upheaval?"

"What relevance could it have had? I could not have been swayed from my duties by the mere promise of foreign trinkets."

"Then now what do you plan to do?" I shifted in my chair. "You will say that you are immune, that you will simply retreat back into your duties until the end of it. But the changes in your world _shall_ touch you. You must be prepared for that."

"I assure you that I am."

"From you, I need no assurances." It was a pointless snub, but now I had revealed what I had not wished to. Not even with _my_ age did complete control come.

"You dislike me." There was nothing plaintive or questioning about Anoris' tone.

Yet I said nothing.

"It is quite strange that they would bring me out here solely for the purpose of informing you that I have occurred. They claim that you helped to found their civilization. Is this true?"

I drew in a breath slowly. "In a fashion." And Anoris was, also in a fashion, the price of this fame. "Though there were others then and now."

Jenral spoke from behind me: "We will be employing some of the younger archivists, historians, and teachers in informing Anoris in greater detail, and using a lot of your historical records. They were very detailed."

"Yes, thank you," I mumbled it perfunctorily, at the moment not caring what Jenral thought of me.

When the Zentraedi had truly started to make their civilization, it had been my job to fill their databanks and speak to their children on all the topics I could think of, as they were trying to develop and sustain an intellectual-cultural thread on rugged Fantoma. It had been my fixed occupation for hundreds of years, while their numbers slowly climbed high enough to make them consider searching for a new world.

I clambered out of my chair and turned to them, looking up. "And what are your reasons for incorporating Anoris in this way?"

I felt that I knew, and was not disappointed.

"He has all the abilities you were conditioned for. If there is a potential resource, you must use it instead of throwing it away." Jenral stroked her chin. "It was always our intention to keep our word. And we have: _we _have not cloned you. But I am sorry, Venerable Exedore. We cannot be wasteful, especially with so many of us suddenly dead."

I understood it from that perspective. Zentraedi were giants in a universe not scaled for them and they had had to learn to value thrift and opportunism if they wished to make a complex civilization.

And they also tended towards the brusque.

It was again Jenral who spoke. "But don't worry, Venerable Exedore. Your place in history is assured. No one will literally think of you and Anoris as the same, and whatever he does or has done, your deeds can't be erased.

"Think of this a compassionate choice. You're separate beings, but there are few who won't experience his face and voice and associate it with you; that shadow would make it difficult to be taken seriously as himself, to be honestly employed without making others nervous.

"And this is also true for his status as a willing participant in the Survivalist rebellion, even if he was given no other choices in that matter. To protect Anoris from assassination and assault, he must be kept close to us."

"But why have you bothered to come all this way? Do not mistake it for ingratitude, but my reaction hardly has any relevance to your intentions."

"This was my initiative," Jenral said. "Blen has undergone enough reconstruction, the dead have been enough mourned for, the conditions which lead to the uprisings have been enough discussed, that I felt you ought to know. And furthermore, there are several surviving scientists and psychologists who are interested in studying the reactions and reflexes of a direct clone."

"And of his genetic source, I would suppose," Lantas added in a low voice.

"I don't deny it," Jenral said. "But without that justification, not even I would not have been able to pay for this journey and my accompaniment." She gestured to the other two Zentraedi. "As it was, it took a fair amount of influence to arrange this."

"I suppose, then, it's better than not knowing." Lantas crossed her arms.

"Tell me," I added. "Has his lifespan been enhanced?"

"No; Temron's group lacked the resources and capacity. We will see if he wants it, and then decide if we are going to give it."

"Then I am very thankful that you have come all this way, but there is more information that I require. Who allowed my cloning template to be utilized? Your predecessors assured me that it would remain untouched."

Silence in the room.

"You heard him!" Lantas called out, voice loud in the chamber. "_Who_ allowed such an abomination to be created?"

I placed a hand on her back, stroking it carefully. Her body was taut underneath my palm, subtly trembling with a repressed rage, which was justified.

She snarled, "Well?"

Jenral seemed to ignore her, asking me instead, "Are you certain you don't want to rest first?"

I saw Lantas looking at me, obviously still fighting her concern and anger.

"No, I am fine. Tell me and I shall rest afterwards."

----

They took us back to the meeting room and used some video stills to further educate us.

The one who had stolen my cloning template was Murta Hilo, a young female. She had claimed that it was done partially just to see what would happen, out of curiosity. They were debating her fate still, but it would likely be imprisonment/hard labour, since she did not directly participate in the Survivalists' rebellion.

The Survivalists who had refused to follow Temron had been found confined, and were to be set free, but a system like theirs was never going to be allowed to rise again.

The Survivalist forces had been augmented by a number of clones made from crudely-done facilities run with stolen equipment and amateur construction, facilities that had also birthed Anoris. These clones would be treated like Anoris, but educated less and freed sooner, and had been designated by numbers rather than surnames. Anoris had apparently been given an original name because he had been intended to be...special.

Oh, yes, _special_. A symbol of the clarity the Survivalists had wanted to reclaim, and a sign that even the great Zentraedi of the past approved of what they were doing.

Utter foolishness.

And yet they could have done it. If only a few things had happened differently, perhaps Anoris would have been standing at Temron's side now, and all the Zentraedi civilization would have been crumbled and suppressed.

The thought was sickening.

Jenral asked, "Why don't you tell us, Venerable Exedore, what your objections to Anoris are? It might help circumstances."

Of course my feelings had been visible to her, even at our differing scales. "I look to Anoris and see an intrusion onto my previous territory, almost a parody of myself. Yet I must face the fact that he exists, and I propose that you let me tell him some things on my own. I will not keep you from your world any longer than you wish to be."

They agreed, and Anoris was brought into the main room. He sat down, and Staldral stood at his shoulder.

I asked Anoris, "What is it that you think of me?"

He took his time in answering. "There are the...obvious physical differences, but you seem to have an odd softness to you that I do not recognize in myself. But I have no reason to be angry with your alterations."

"Are you certain of this? Or does it in fact startle you?"

Anoris took his time answering. "I...It actually is unsettling. You are a tiny, withered husk, and I...ah." He looked away slightly, grimacing with what might have been distaste.

I knew what I must look like to him. My wizened, vaguely avian face gave me the look of an old scavenging bird (although some of my friends claimed that I looked very wise). My hair was present, white and thin and receded scarcely past my forehead. My pate and hands were spotted with a colour similar to my original skin tone, but my flesh was still the grey-brown that it had been recoloured to, long ago. I was also much more robe than body.

I studied my clone again. Despite the distance between us, Anoris still seemed to _loom_ in a fashion. He also looked somehow clumsy to me, brutish, crude, because my time as a Zentraedi _Domillan_ had been one of inferiority, of stunted ability. To think that they had wanted to recall the best of me by going _backwards_. Madness. But madness was, of course, not unexpected in the world.

The look on Anoris' face was still neutral, despite his vulnerable admission. I made sure to meet that one-eyed gaze as well as I could, and to restrain my own mixed emotions.

He stated, "I believe your inquiry has another purpose: You wish to know if I feel disoriented, without direction."

"Do you?"

Anoris paused.

"Not enough to renege upon my duty."

"No," I said, more to myself. Then I refocused on Anoris. "In time you shall undergo your own rites of passage. Myself or another sitting there and retelling history at you shall not bring on that change alone."

"Yet I must know it if I am to serve."

"Of course. And what of the Zentraedi legions involved with the Great Alteration? Do you wish to know their fates?"

"I know the basics of what happened to them. But I do not have any more of a...personal investment in such."

Anoris abruptly frowned. "But I am unsure as to why my progenitor would involve himself with a female. The conflicts that arise would be upsetting to his equilibrium _and _his objectivity."

Lantas' voice was calm when she spoke. "You should be used to upsets. And there are many more things which can interfere with your...objectivity. It's no surprise that Temron Kravshera failed, just like the Robotech Masters did before him. All of them were fighting against the inevitable: despite attempts to cage them, our complex natures will always assert themselves."

Anoris leaned forward slightly, his good eye fixed upon us. Staldral gripped his shoulder more tightly, so much that he winced.

"Yes," I said, "All creatures possess emotions, which cannot be separated from the so-called 'logical' processes. And there are prices for everything; few things are an absolute good or an absolute disaster. The Zentraedi lost many things in their transition, but we made gains as well. And it is far easier to idealize what you have never experienced."

"So you do not regret what you have become."

"My only regret is that I had not grasped certain truths sooner. But often change cannot be anticipated, merely reacted to. At a certain time, you simply realize that you are different, and are unable to trace exactly how that has occurred."

Anoris lifted one hand, and Staldral yanked him back against the seat. But once he had recovered, Anoris only rubbed pensively at his chin, closing his eye in thought.

"It's true, then, that I find your presence and your tale disquieting. I can only have confidence that my life will not turn out like yours."

I reached up to the small golden band that I wore around my neck. It was so incongruous an adornment on me that few noticed it, but I now clicked it open and knelt down, spreading it on the table's surface. From his angle, Anoris likely could not see what I was doing.

I removed a small data crystal from inside the choker, and connected it to one of its ends.

A holo-monitor sprang to life, and I made it as large as I could, though it was still too small for Anoris.

"Anoris, would you like to know what happened to Breetai?"

Anoris repeated the name. "Bree...tai?"

"You know that you remember him. Just as you feel your name should be 'Exedore'. Do you also feel that you should have been standing at his side, rather than that of Temron Kravshera?"

"You are correct in guessing that I carry your name internally. But I served Dolza, and in any event the _Domillan_ belongs to whomever has him. In what capacity could I have favoured one master over another?"

"Yes, you only remember Dolza. But in truth I worked with Breetai before that. I knew Breetai in the days when I was still responsible for ore tallies, for the Zentraedi miners working on Fantoma. That was before we were converted into warriors to satisfy imperial ambitions."

"That has no bearing whatsoever upon the situation." Anoris' voice was sharper now, perhaps concealing shock at the Zentraedi's true origins.

"And I betrayed Dolza."

Anoris' jaw dropped.

I converted the blankets into a makeshift cushion and settled myself into it, tucking my walking stuck underneath one arm. I went through the images stored on my data crystal, and slowly told Anoris of the First Robotech War and what happened afterwards: the Malcontent Uprisings, the Sentinels campaign, the death of Breetai.

When Drannin was mentioned, Anoris suddenly asked, "And have _you_ produced offspring?"

"No." It came from Lantas and I almost simultaneously.

"And what do you consider me?"

I glared at him. "A creature made without my consent." I paused, pondered, and then added: "Though you have quickly made use of ideas that you have just learned."

Perhaps Anoris was also toying with me as I was with him; exploring, probing, and enjoying seeing the other feel unsettled. I had not been above such actions, not even in the very old days.

_Perhaps we should give then another present and then see what they do._

I continued, telling him of the resettling of Fantoma, and the eventual departure from the rock planet. Ophicuron thoughtfully came in and offered me a small thing full of water, which to us was a bucket that Lantas had to help me lift to drink from.

Of course these were all terse and inferior explanations, and the finer details would come in time, from the younger Zentraedi as Jenral had promised. I did not envy those youths who would come face to face with living history.

"And why do you tell me these things when you are so obviously resentful of me?" Anoris inquired.

"It is true that I am not comfortable with you. But I also wish to make a small gesture towards beginning to shape you."

Anoris replied, "I must admit that it also seems to satisfy something inexplicable in me."

"Agreed. But do not mistake this for unreserved acceptance."

"I would expect nothing less. After this meeting, it is likely that we shall not meet again; I will attempt to make sure of it."

"No. That is not enough. I shall wait seven years, and then come to see how you have progressed."

***

I fought the urge to sleep; I wasn't _that _infirm!

Lantas and I were back in our sitting room where we had first heard the broadcasts, sitting beside each other on the couch. I had changed out of my formal robes.

Through a combination of novelty-seeking and a simple need to outrace decay, Lantas and I had lived in many different places. Several had been large, serving as museums to our long lives, and sometimes we had had two parts of a house belonging each to ourselves. Our current dwelling still had much on display, but it was rather small, and we shared it closely. We were rarely apart now, day or night.

The walls of every room were adorned with large metallic patches, from which holograms sprang to life when the right systems were online. These were images from lifetimes over long ago: the worlds we had travelled and the friends we had outlived. These images were paired with solid objects, art and decorations, which also evoked certain memories.

"I had to stay there," Lantas told me. "I had to learn to deal with his existence, too, or after you are gone, the thought of him would haunt me. Though what he _did _is a different matter from what he _is_; for the first, he is deserving of all the scrutiny he receives."

"Yes." I agreed with her. There was, even now, a loathing stirring inside me at the thought of Anoris. His helping the Survivalists form their battle strategies could not entirely be forgotten.

The ancient Zentraedi-Human alliance had begun with the unspoken truth the humans could not pass judgement on what the Zentraedi had done in the name of empire-building, for the Zentraedi were not subject to human law. But Anoris and his captors were both Zentraedi, and he was now open to their justice. Anoris had to accept the fate they had chosen for him, and it seemed as though he would.

"There's no shame in feeling that Anoris spoils something; I'd feel the same. To have someone following my work, who looked exactly like me, sounded....It's disgusting." She smoothed back her long hair. "Though I also have my own selfish reasons for objecting to this."

"And there is no shame in those, either."

"Hah. Self-flatterer." Her smile was ambivalent.

I returned a smile of equal conflict, though the ambivalence had nothing to do with her.

Lantas.

It had surprised many, including ourselves, the strength, length, and depth of our bonding. It had seemed so..._fanciful_ for anyone, of any gender or temperament, to keep the same mate for centuries, especially when we had been each other's first.

And there had of course been problems, and also a time when we had seen others, both with each others' consent, but nothing had ever been enough for us to feel that we were truly parted. I believed, despite the recurring inquiries to the contrary, that it had to do with more than our being one of the few things that did not eventually disappear from each others' lives.

So of course Lantas would not have stood being shielded from the sight of Anoris, or being taken home once it had been made clear what the Zentraedi had come for.

"You know why they kept Anoris, don't you? It wasn't just to 'use a resource'. They still want to keep you alive, with them in some fashion. Or at least, a few of them did."

"Yes, I surmised that. Though it might not be that true, anymore. Likely many have outgrown me."

"But you wish to believe that some still remember you, and I think it would be true. Though for that to be their motivation to keep Anoris alive...is completely ludicrous." She shifted position, put one sharp elbow on the armrest to make a thinker's pose. "Insulting."

"It is all those things."

"You are _you_," Lantas said. "None can take your place. Poetically, literally...none."

I was aware of all this, but somehow it felt good to hear it from her on this matter. And to know that I was not alone in this confused indignation. "Nor you."

But then her face crinkled slightly. She licked her lips and swallowed once. "And why do you want to see him again?"

"I merely want to make certain that all my predictions are true. It does not mean that I will forgive him, or wish to make him into something that he is not...."

"I know that." Her voice snapped, losing the last of the drowsy relief that had come. "But you've discharged your obligation to him; there's no reason for you to go back."

"There is something that needs to be settled."

"What could _possibly_ need to be settled, if you want to offer no forgiveness or no kinship?"

"I simply need to know where he ends up."

"_Why_?" she asked again. Then Lantas drew back into her chair. "I know...I want to cope with Anoris. But this isn't the way to do it. It's better to just forget. Let him live alone. Free...of us."

"It won't be for long. Then we will all return to where we ought to be."

"You don't need to go. You owe him nothing."

"But I wish to, just to make certain of things, and only once. Attribute it to unwanted paternal instincts if you must but---"

"Paternal! He's only a clone."

I suddenly realized all the things that my choice of words could mean. "Oh, Lantas, I did not mean that consciously. I don't want him to be my child; he is not that. But I want to see where he has gone, and if he has adjusted."

"I know...you're making that clear. And I know you don't want to forget everything he did. But it makes no sense."

"I am confident that I am not blind. Perhaps it is my fate to be always concerned with any Zentraedi who has not yet benefited from culture."

Her expression softened only slightly. "And it will give you an excuse to visit Blen, won't it?"

We simply looked at each other for a few moments.

"I can't stop you. But I am going to come with you." She reached in and clasped my face in her hands, and a kiss followed. New warmth flowed into me, soothing my own rattled nerves.

But I had seen her eyes watering, and wondered again how much of her feelings towards Anoris I truly knew. "You do not have to come. I would not hold it against you."

"No, I'll...come with you. I have obligations, too."

"I can accept an obligation. But what do you feel towards Anoris now?"

"I still despise him. I hope that piece of offal rots. And it's because I'm childish. The idea of someone _replacing_ you; I still see it as that. And that others might expect me to be like a _mother_ to that creature...." She buried her face in her hands, then looked back at me, continuing on.

"Sometimes, when we were...young, I would suddenly start worrying about you turning back...into what you were before. It seemed too good to be possible, that _you_ could become someone who seemed so gentle and kind. It wasn't just being a giant again, but...everything else, as well.

"And he...he is may live beyond you. When you're dead, _he_ will still exist, and that disgusts me, and it angers me. It would almost be...like an imitation of the idea that you could still be....

"Maybe that's the reason I need to come with you; not only to help you physically, and because of what we have, but because...perhaps then I can finally see that Anoris is only Anoris. That he is no threat, he is no shock, and what truly makes you Exedore is not found in your genes, but rather what time has done to their vessel.

"I know that there is no shame in feeling this way. I just need to overcome it myself."

"You shall, just as you have overcome all your struggles."

"I know. Let's make the arrangements before we lose the nerve."

I could rest now. But soon it would be time to venture into the outside world again, to share the news of what had occurred on that ship.

----

"The Survivalists are going to be disbanded. If any similar movement ever attempts to arise, they shall not be allowed to assemble, and encouraged to join the military instead. If they would still persist, immediate action would be taken to stop them."

Lantas and I stood before an assemblage of native Tirolians natural-born and clone, as well as beings who might have first passed for them.

They were Micronized Zentraedi.

The foundations for Micronization had been re-laid by Meror Sadore, one of the Shaped Children who had experienced newspace and returned with subtle insight and intelligence, and weak preternatural abilities which still manifested randomly among those of the Zentraedi population who were descended from them.

Unfortunately, the data had not come from him complete, and had taken a long time to process and develop. Currently Micronization via non-Protoculture engineering was easy and harmless, but also irreversible.

Still, a small group, and then a larger one, had desired to be Micronized, citing access to resources as the primary motivation. They built up a store of capital and then went to work trying to make the process possible. With no collective name, they could now be found on Earth, Tirol, and even a few females on New Praxis, and there had been some interbreeding with these other races, but not total assimilation.

Lido Ran, a younger female Zentraedi, now remarked, "They never should have let a group like that form in the first place. Now they've paid for it."

"It didn't have to end in civil war," replied Nantrus. She was a half-Zentraedi, half-Tirolian, although such things could now be measured in smaller fractions. "It was just a way for them to live."

"_Oh_," Lido scoffed. "And _what _a way. That place must have been a pressure bomb. They should have stopped the Survivalists then, any way they could've."

"What's happened can't be changed," added Kertellus, one of Lantas' fellows from those old times. "We have to concentrate on the future now."

Almalta, another Micronian clone, spoke up. "And there's going to be no future for you if you waste time fearing war coming from anywhere. The Survivalist campaign is over, it's not reached Tirolian soil, so let's not act as if they are coming tomorrow."

Lido snarled, "Tell that to _us_! My people have lost their lives!"

I let their bickering wash over me for a while. I closed my eyes, and opened them again. "Now is the other information that I have come to deliver."

Though I had spoken quietly, most of them instantly silenced and looked at me. I was no longer surprised by such reactions, but hopefully I had not let them make me immodest.

Carefully, I told them of Anoris. When I finished, there was no movement in the auditorium for several moments.

Another young Zentraedi said, "So they just replace you. How's that for hundreds of years of service?"

"I was grateful for every year that they gave me. Recall that your presence here and Micronization is a recent development; for a while I was the only Micronized Zentraedi, and before that I had thought my time with them was over. But they gave me an opportunity to remain with them, and to retain their respect. To throw a tantrum now would be to disregard all of that. Everything moves on; that is as true now as it was when they abandoned Fantoma."

I allowed myself to pause and soften. "Anoris is not going to be a replacement; he is merely an archivist, as I essentially was in the beginning. Were it up to me, I would rather have my legacy ended, and had no concerns about perpetuating it. Yet it is not my decision to make."

A legacy. Yes. But I would let more than my time on Fantoma define me. Without Zentraedi on that world, I had become a native Tirolian historian instead, others paying me for my extensive and lucid memories, and so I did not remain idle. The Tirolian-based Zentraedi and their children had often been among my customers, though I had also formed more individualized friendships with some of their number.

"Are you just going to let them force him to do what they want? What about all the freedom you've talked about? That you helped us attain?"

I sighed inwardly. "There are always other things to be considered. By the laws of society, Anoris must make penance for his role. The other artificially-made Survivalists will undergo the same probation."

"You still don't understand." It was Dalthan, a female Tirolian whom I had done some work with. "He was made from your form, your template. He's practically your son. Don't you care about him at all?"

Many were now watching me closely, to see how I would react.

And I scowled.

"_He is no such thing_." That came from Lantas instead, a low tone with cold emphasis. "He is a _duplicate._ Anoris will be given his due, you must trust them on that. Exedore and I have done all we can, and he must learn to make his own way, on Nuadull."

"So did you leave him with anything at all?" asked Dalthan. She was sneering now.

I told them how our meeting had gone, and that I planned to visit him again. That seemed to mollify a few, though I had no doubt that some thought me cold for what likely in their minds constituted something other than what I thought it did.

But Anoris was not the same as a child. Instead, he was a distorted image of my old form, and it would be better for him to develop largely outside my shadow, so to speak.

The last thing that he had said to me before being escorted back into the ship was, "I thank you for your time. As payment, I shall attempt to have your cloning template destroyed at the end of my term, and declare myself in exile from your world."

"Thank you," Lantas had said in response, before I could speak.

Thus it was over. The Zentraedi had returned home, where Anoris would be cloistered and further educated. Though it had been good to see the Zentraedi majority again, I knew that their place was on their other world, as well.

----

"You know that I...caught myself wishing that all the archaic human traditions were true."

"Mm. Children inevitably following the paths of their parents, perpetuating those exact conditions and providing a form of immortality? But that's not really true, and we've known that for a long time." Lantas spoke gently.

"Yes." We had seen several generations of families pass, and found no member who could have served as a replacement for another, due to the strange alchemy of genetics. "And even in this case, too much has happened to my mind and body for Anoris and I to ever be considered exact reflections of each other."

I changed position to be closer to her. She also reacted, putting her hand on my upper arm. "It's your mortality you're thinking about, isn't it?"

"...Ah. Slightly."

I thought it likely that I did not have long left to live, and none of the other life-prolonging methods were safe enough for me to chance them, especially with my lifespan already expanded to this degree.

I still wished that I could live longer. There were always new things to discover and new work to conduct. I could have seen the Zentraedi grow from a single transplanted city-population to a world of nations, or perhaps even a nation of worlds. And _she _still had that longer life to live, one I would not share in.

Yet however much this felt like symbiosis, it was not. Lantas and I had retained our independence, which was what we had wanted all along. She was quite strong, and would be able to move on afterwards.

"...Everything ends," Lantas replied. "As you said. And you've done a fine job at everything you wanted to do; remember that."

I had visited Nuadull and its first city of Blen several times, watched the buildings under construction and visited the temporary shelters, listening to their plans for the future, but there were times when my interest was wanting. Some instinct was driving me to stay closer to home.

Lantas said, "I...felt something towards him too, something besides anger. Though I still agree." She then added, quietly, "He was damnably cold in comparison to you."

I squeezed her hand, twining her limp fingers with my own, despite the minor ache it brought to my hand.

There was silence for a while, before I heard her ask, "Do you ever regret that we never had children?"

"No more than you do, I am certain."

She chuckled, reassured.

The instincts had surfaced at times, but it had always been no great battle to defeat them. It was not in our characters to be parents.

Most of the time I was content. Unexpected developments such as Anoris could not sour me; I would certainly make the most of it.


	2. Chapter 2

**Legacy Character: A Story in Two Parts**

**Part 2: ****Anoris' Story**

The shuttle returned to Nuadullspace from Tirol without incident. The landing jolted Anoris, slamming his back into the wall. He scowled, but quickly suppressed the expression.

He waited for them to come to him. After the Nuadullian Zentraedi had taken him away from the Survivalist camp, they had confined him for a while, until news of the forthcoming journey to Tirol had been dropped without preamble.

His predecessor's rejection did not bother him. In truth, he would rather not have encountered Exedore at all. Seeing his antecedent directly, had been..._frightening_, seemed to have been the word which fit it the most. It was a foreign term, but not entirely unknown to the Zentraedi. Or at least, the Zentraedi he recalled. Perhaps these Zentraedi knew fear much more easily than his contemporaries had.

And almost as much as fear, it was disgusting. Even if he admittedly seemed to have done well his duty to the Zentraedi collective, Anoris did not want to be such a thing as Exedore was, stunted and weak and consorting with females, cut off from his people.

Thankfully he had kept most of his reactions hidden, and now it was all behind him.

Anoris heard the clanking of Staldral Trem's boots as she walked back to where he was being held. "Time to get up."

Anoris knew he could not do so until she released the restraints around his body. He tensed at the prospect, sweating, but offered no complaint, even though his true opinion must have been obvious.

The belt-like waist restraint clicked open under her hands, and Staldral moved back far enough to allow Anoris to stand. She towered over him, but her hand was instantly on his shoulder again, to guide him in the direction of the control room.

Ophicuron, the _physician_, something almost as unnatural as a female engaging in close contact with a male, appeared to intercept them.

"Is there any particular reason why you have to shadow him so closely? I don't think he will be going anywhere, and it won't help him adjust."

Staldral ignored that, and kept marching Anoris on.

Protesting his own treatment would be useless; the sooner these protocols were over with, the sooner he cold return to the business of his new existence, whatever it would be.

---

Jenral Malta was at the shuttle's control room. The viewing screen first appeared dark, but Anoris, looking closer, could discern the metallic seams of a tunnel roof. Yes, they would have to enter by an underground way, so as not to startle any of the populace with his appearance.

_I am living history,_ Anoris thought suddenly, but had control of himself in an instant: no, he was simply a clone of a famous entity who was now essentially obsolete, someone that he was very different from.

His head hurt; memories of rocky plateaux swirling with green gases invaded his mind for a moment, but they passed, leaving nothing in her wake.

When the four of them descended the ramp, the hangar appeared to be deserted. A few ships and equipment waited idly, their designs still incongruous to his eye: there was nothing that looked truly Zentraedi.

"Come on now," Staldral said, roughly, before Ophicuron intervened again.

"Let him look if he wants to. He'll have plenty of time to do anything else later."

Anoris realized he'd been standing on the floor, not walking, looking at the ships, for several moments. "My apologies; let us continue."

And they had, their footsteps echoing in the chamber.

"We will have to place you back into the quarters where we first put you," Jenral said. "But soon we'll find a better place, and get you some proper clothes."

Anoris was not comforted. He didn't feel he needed to be, and Jenral was courteous, but he had seen something when he had met her for the first time, some dislike of him just below her surface.

"Here we are." Staldral reached into one of the pouches on her heavy belt and drew out a commlink, which Anoris already knew how to use. "Call to us if you have difficulty with anything."

Then she left, which Anoris was very much fine with.

The layout and contents of this room looked very much like those of the quarters that Temron Kravshera had left him in, a fact which was, if not entirely comforting, nonetheless had provided him with a cooling sense of equilibrium, which now returned.

Anoris stripped off his prison uniform, donned the yellow bed-smock, and promptly went to sleep. His dreams were jumbled and largely forgotten upon awakening.

An un-uniformed male soldier soon came, entering with a tray of food and liquids, and his expression suggested a sharp, silent loathing. Anoris ignored it.

----

There were days of emptiness, and others when he was given textual material to read, in order to better understand the new order. But there was no way to put this knowledge to use, and the inactivity slowly became grating, though at a pace that was geological in comparison to others who might have ended up in a cell with nothing to do.

Eventually a Zentraedi appeared at his door that he had not seen before. This one was oddly short and slight, like Anoris was, but with normalized features.

"If you'd come with me, Sir?"

He was trembling. Anoris ignored it; he would not ask the other Zentraedi what his particular physical condition was. Non-combatant Zentraedi were supposed to answer questions for others, not ask them.

Though the rules were different here.

Finally they stopped before a pair of doors set into the tunnel. Someone had painted them with images of ancient Zentraedi machines in battle, along with some vaguely-outlined rocks and soil for the Pods to stand upon. The images, at least, were familiar.

"These are the archives," the other male said. He then stood still, bobbing up a trifle on his feet.

Anoris had been told what an "archive" was, and what it had to do with his new position, so there was no need to question that.

His escort was saying, "Fortunately, the, uh, chambers were spared during, the, uh, attack. But you'll soon be being quartered aboveground, and merely work at the archives.

"The plan is, uh, the plan is to give you recently-produced records, and have you help integrate them into the archives. And citizens are allowed to come to you with any questions they might have. I'm Hara Selam, and you can ask _me_ any questions you want."

Except for the male's name, Anoris knew all this already. He had also been told that it would still take some time before the city was stable enough to allow him to perform the job in full; perhaps that time had already come. And if he was being given permission.... "Hara, what is your physical condition?"

"My what?"

"Your physical condition. You seem undersized in some areas, oversized in others."

"Oh, Sir, I uh...I'm an adolescent." Hara licked his lips and bobbed up and down again. "It means I'm not finished growing, but I'm close to it. Zentraedi are...you know that Zentraedi are _born_ right now, and we start out at as babies--a very small stage, and get older and bigger until we become adults. I'm not quite there yet.

"Normally I don't think I'd be here, but my superior was killed in the attack, so I'm...I'm one of the people who's been assigned to help you become adjusted."

Anoris had been informed of the biological life cycles already, but decided not to correct the...young one.

Hara turned and began to push at the doors to open them. He spoke as he made the effort and ushered Anoris inside, despite the exertion that the former took. "I'll tell you, though, we showed those Survivalists something. _Civilization_ is what sent those dirt-eaters straight to the Void! We had better guns, better tech, and better strategy--Ha!" Hara snapped his fingers vigorously, along with making an equally powerful sweep with his arm. But he straightened up and added, "Pardoning the last one, of course, Sir."

----

Hara was part of another group of three, this one including a female named Yaita (herself named after a famous historical figure, apparently) and an older male named Nim, the senior member.

All of his helpers seemed quivering and distant at first, but gradually they settled in. They read to him, showed him videos, and taught him how to speak and write the new Zentraedi language, with its altered syntax, simpler glyphs, new words, and new idioms.

Anoris learned of that strange girl, that Minmei. Though the Zentraedi had long ago learned that her music was actually considered a frivolity by her native race, her relevance to the Zentraedi remained enshrined, even after she had mysteriously disappeared. Seeing the hologram of her had a strangely hypnotic effect on him, which left Anoris blinking and wondering at it afterwards.

They gave him new clothes to wear; at work he wore a purple-trimmed black robe with narrow sleeves and a high, rounded collar, and otherwise could chose from the second- and third-hand garments he had been given.

When they looked over his face, it was discovered that nothing could be done to restore his eye, and so Anoris asked them to leave his facial asymmetry as it was. "It would help to distinguish me," he had said, much to his own astonishment.

When asked about other distinctions, Anoris had declined to have his head shaven, but had found the urge to ask them to change his hair, and they did, cutting it shorter in the back, closer to his nape, and also with shortened, pointed bangs.

And now he was being taken outside. It was not for his public reveal, which still was coming soon, but for getting him adjusted to the natural environment, among the hills and canyons near Blen, things which seemed large even to Zentraedi, and Anoris knew there were farther and more diverse territories beyond that, where the Survivalists had lived.

It was very deep in the night, so that the chance of their being seen on their brief walk aboveground in passing between the underground areas and the city limits was practically nil.

A cool breeze now ruffled his hair and the edges of his clothing. The guard and the scholars surrounding him were quiet for the moment, until Yaita spoke up:

"What do you think of it, Sir?"

And he found that it felt...good to be out there, even, peculiarly, the way that it smelled. But Anoris frowned at her intrusion. Were they again going to attempt to propagandize their lifestyle, instead of allowing him to discover it for himself?

"It is a strange sight." He was also remarking on the lights of the city below. There weren't as many as there would have been in a non-Zentraedi city, he'd been told, due to power concerns, but it was not completely dark.

"But I enjoy the way this environment feels upon me. But while it is true that Temron never allowed me outside, he said it was for my own protection."

Yaita added, "He wished to keep you stunted. Likely he remembered from example, that Zentraedi exposed to the outside world tend to rebel."

"You can only speculate on his motivations," Anoris said, "Perhaps he only desired my safety." It was a strange thing he had been doing, allowing himself to pursue deeper arguments and stronger lines of questioning, and also to turn the words of those in authority back upon them.

"It was just to feed his own ego," added Nim. "So all our civilization would bow down and worship him as overlord."

"Did you believe in what he was doing, Sir?" asked Bakorel, another female, who had come along to monitor him.

Anoris could not come up with a definitive answer. "My duty was to serve. And I understand that one of you is likely about to reply with the retort that now I am at a point where I can consider my life. And that is true. But I do not love you unreservedly."

Bakorel: "Do you like being drawn into a line of questioning, Sir? To exercise your mental abilities beyond simply figuring out the best way to destroy things?"

"There was nothing simple about such a thing," Anoris said, before he could stop himself. At least he wasn't shouting.

But a question which had been building could finally be asked. "Nim, are there truly so many going to be so many who are upset at my imitation of Exedore?"

"It depends on who you speak with; Jenral may have given you the wrong idea, since she's a bit of a fanatic for history, and largely arranged that mission to Tirol by herself. Among the rest of us, the name 'Exedore Formo' still carries meaning, but its power varies widely, and I personally do not think that there's going to be much anger directed at you for that. Some fear and shock, yes, but that will fade easily in comparison to your status as a Survivalist. Don't underestimate the latter."

"There aren't any other Formos left, you know," Hara put in, interrupting the silence after a time. "When the civilization was getting started, Exedore asked that all Formo clone line material be destroyed; nothing would be incorporated into the new children they grew from old gene samples.

"He was afraid of having children, and didn't want the next worst thing, other Formos asking for some connection with him. He didn't have any with the other Formo clones in the old days, but knew that things would change now, with blood-born children coming up. Paranoid stuff."

Anoris repeated, "It does not matter. Not in the sense of my feeling rejected. But perhaps I...require this knowledge of him to understand my status further."

Anoris had seen the face of his progenitor often in the records, and read some of his publicly-available journals, too. Some of Exedore's movements still appalled him, as his predecessor seemed to revel in the loss of his Zentraedi equilibrium and objectivity.

Yaita went on. "I agree with Nim. You _should_ be much more concerned with your status as a Survivalist, though if you emphasize the constraints of your previous situation and appear repentant, it might help them accept you."

"I am afraid that I cannot. At that time, I never once thought of betraying Temron."

"But did you _love_ it?", Hara asked. "Did you really want to do it, and believe that it was right?"

"I did," Anoris replied. "Inasmuch as I knew that it was what I had to do, and to Zentraedi of my era, that amounts to the same thing. I understand how appalling you must find this, but...." What?

"But what?" said Yaita, as if echoing his thoughts down to the confused tone. "You are still going to be held accountable for it, so you must be honest?"

"Yes, I must. As much as I am honest about enjoying this 'natural' environment. I can tell them only what I was, and that I feel no remorse."

He remembered waking up, taking the final amniotic (a word these new Zentraedi had eventually taught him) breaths of the cloning chamber, before the fluid had drained away.

His initial steps had been strong, as he had walked unerringly towards the blurred figures waiting just beyond the chamber's edge.

But somehow he had stumbled, falling forward, but was caught by a pair of strong arms before he could hit the ground. Anoris had looked up into a brown tabard, with a crisscross of yellow braiding on the chest, his gaze travelling farther up as he had straightened himself on his own.

The Zentraedi had the features of a Kravshera, and his bright blue hair was edged with grey. There was a small cybernetic component covering his left eye, which Anoris would later learn was connected to mechanisms in his arm and hand, which would interface with any automatic weapon and allowed for greater targeting accuracy; this was from the autopsy that the Nuadullian authorities had performed on Temron's burned and shattered corpse.

"I am Temron Kravshera," he had said, pushing Anoris carefully into a standing position.

Anoris had taken a few steps back and then rubbed at his face. "What is going on? Has there been an accident?" He had had no idea what exactly "accident" could have meant.

"In a manner of speaking, yes."

This Kravshera was dressed as a high-ranking male commander. But as Anoris' vision was clearing, he saw that the outfit had a crude, patched-together look.

"I am about to tell you things that are very shocking."

"Then please tell me, m'lord." Even if his outfit was crude, this Kravshera must have held that rank. For why would a Zentraedi have attempted to imitate a higher officer?

"You are a second clone of Exedore Formo. He was instrumental in a great change in Zentraedi, a very long time ago. Centuries."

Moment by moment, Anoris had found that he was becoming more comfortable, more decisive. Very good.

Temron continued on; the other figures in the room had not spoken. "The ones who searched for Zor's ship found it on a world full of Micronians, like Tirolians but far less advanced and much more fragmented. The Zentraedi became addicted to the things the Micronians offered, and when Dolza came to destroy them for their contamination, they turned against him. They sided with the Micronians, and Exedore Formo and Breetai Tul led this betrayal.

"Now, today, the Zentraedi live like Micronians, but at their true size. They have sundered the ranks into something difficult, disjointed, which is reflected in their society. Males and females mix freely, and they manufacture children with their bodies. Only a small fraction of them still participate in the business of fighting, and even then, they don't actively seek it, but passively lie back and wait for battle to come to them."

For the first time, Temron smiled. "I want to help them. I am going to bring the Zentraedi together into a single unit, so they will be free again, and have no conflict with each other, no fear. It will take time, but if we persevere and are flexible, the truth will come in the end. We brought you to life to be a part of this."

"I?"

"You were one of the greatest minds of the Zentraedi, and when we return to life, I will need a strong advisor at my side to guide me."

Temron had put his hand atop Anoris' wet head. "But your progenitor still lives. Because of that, you will be Anoris Formo."

Anoris, thus christened, had almost said, _Yet Exedore is my true name,_ before stopping himself. The duty of the Zentraedi was to do whatever his or her superior wanted. Thus, we would be Anoris.

Another male had then walked up to Temron and given him a box. Temron had passed it to Anoris. "This will be your clothing. I'm sorry that we were unable to make something better."

Inside it had been the imitation advisor's outfit that the salvage party had eventually caught him in. Anoris had later realized how ill-made the uniform was, with a threadbare, clumsily-folded cowl, misaligned piping, and boots whose shoes had been spray-painted purple. But he had at the time worn it without complaint.

"But you have to rest now; I will show you to your quarters. While you recuperate, the first phase of the campaign will begin. I know this is difficult to hear, but you don't need to concern yourself with that yet. We will call you when we need you, but right now your first priority is to rest and become adjusted."

Another of the personnel had handed him an artefact called a "book", a crudely-bound thing which explained what these "Survivalists" were: Zentraedi who lived as in the old times, for purposes of relaxation and clarity. There was a camp of females nearby, with the same manifesto, though Anoris never met any of them.

Anoris had only waited in that room, not fearful of exploring, simply devoid of any urge to do it.

And now?

***

There was always plenty to do; stacks and files of transmissions had arrived, to be transcribed into the main database. Because they were recent, many dealt with the public's reaction the Survivalist attack, which had been documented extensively. Anoris felt a twinge at this that he could not deny, a cold ache in his chest that refused to go away. Yet at the same time, he could not feel guilt.

Why was that? He ought to learn to balance those two aspects. After all, he would eventually have to deal with the public in a greater capacity.

But now he was being marched before a crowd. Anoris knew from reading the materials that the anticipation and rumours had gradually swelled in intensity, the public only knowing for certain that there was some secret thing that had been taken from the former Survivalist camp by right of salvage.

When the scavenging party had first brought Anoris back before the authorities, it had been with his cowl over his head, and they had subsequently yanked it back downwards for a rude reveal to the assembled politicians and police forces.

This procedure would not be quite so humiliating, but they had requested he put on his prison uniform again, and with a hooded cloak over it, though since his hands, with their unusual red-purple skin, were still revealed, he would likely be considered suspect upon arrival.

It was on an outdoor stage. Anoris could hear the sounds of the crowd, though slightly muffled by the cloth, chattering among itself and likely standing in a disorganized rabble, though he had been told to keep his head bowed, so could not yet see it for certain.

The hood was rolled back slowly, and the crowd below the platform let out a common gasp, although many surprised curses immediately followed.

"This is Anoris Formo," Jenral Malta said from beside him, and she began to give the crowd a truncated version of his origins and future purpose, before beginning to take protests and questions from the crowd.

Anoris watched the contorting faces of the Zentraedi...civilians. They were standing in their variety of _clothing_ (though there were some uniforms among them, those were also highly varied), some with offspring on their shoulders or in their arms, for they apparently tended not to shield their children from things.

Zentraedi had always had individualized appearances and hairstyles, but now there was something about the set of their faces, the position of their bodies, which suggested the true loss of uniformity.

And yet, they were also said to be a close-knit, very social society which often tried to bring everyone into everything. And it seemed to be so, for several repeated others' gestures of head shaking, exchanged glances, and more surprised curses. Perhaps it could be a new kind of unity.

Anoris was silent as the crowd asked questions that seemed not to be directed at him, but the officials surrounding him on the platform. The citizens demanded again and again to know why their government would employ a former Survivalist in any high position, questions which Jenral and others answered in the same way they had for Exedore: because Anoris could still be useful.

When Anoris was asked something, he recalled that he had been told not to answer, and he obeyed this. Angry voices could not sway him, and they all seemed to ask the same things regardless: How could you do this? How could you live with yourself knowing that you made plans to send Zentraedi to murder others? How could you be so calm about it?

And the answer he would have given was that he was simply what he was. But...there was that lingering notion, the words he remembered from Exedore's journals, how Zentraedi had reshaped themselves. Could he still truly lay claim to such indifference? Could it happen--

Something thudded into his temple; Anoris reeled as pain burst in his head. He turned and saw it: a rock, now resting on the edge of the platform.

There was little garbage to throw, most of it having been recycled multiple times, but there was grit and debris, and it pelted the stage.

The citizens were still shouting and carrying on. If there had been a heap of detritus there, all of them would likely have been snatching at it and hurling it. A few protests he could make out:

"Filthy murdering dirt-eater!"

"Rest in the Void!"

"Belly-crawler!"

But mostly it was incoherent, their cries drowning each other out. What crowd was this, who would allow themselves to be collectively swayed by the reactions of a few unruly personages?

Yes, now there were tall Zentraedi in uniforms, breaking up fights, roaring at the troublemakers to stop this and depart. Many immediately submitted, but a few fought, and then folded beneath an oncoming rush of the internal police.

They would all still live, however. There was no longer any sense in simply slaughtering the unruly, when there weren't dozens more of the same clone line ready to fill their positions. Each were individual, each were fragmented. The Survivalists had only been the exception because of the danger they represented.

***

The walls of Anoris' room were coloured a very faint blue-green. An artist had enterprisingly painted some mechanical and circuitry patterns in several places.

It was obviously done to evoke the interior of an ancient "male" Zentraedi ship, and while Anoris had never asked for what scholars called "the womb of the ship" when discussing "his" era, he had seen no reason to deny the artists their peculiar pleasure, and this was as good a room as any for him to live and conduct business in.

Upon the walls were copied images of journals and articles from time periods past, all of which had been handed down by his superiors. The windows were opened and covered in porous screens, letting in the light and air without disturbing his materials.

The chime near the door began to sound, and Anoris pressed one of the buttons on the room's many consoles, signalling his approval. This, and even the door, was a recent addition.

The person who entered was Kurno Norri, a recent addition to his "handlers". Her skin had been dyed green as a statement of fashion, and her hair was purple.

"Oh, hello," Anoris said, hoping that he sounded welcoming. Many likely still thought him fearful of inter-gender interaction. "Please, sit down." He indicated the chair on the other side of his enormous desk. Another bestowal, the chair was intricately carved, but also scuffed and loosely jointed. Justification for ornamentation was another thing that Anoris was still having difficulty accepting, though he felt several steps closer to understanding it intuitively.

They clasped each other's forearms in the polite gesture. Anoris knew that his grip was weak, and his hand had emerged slowly from the sleeve of his robe, but one could not help being sickly when they were born from inferior, cobbled-together facilities.

And her grip was metallic. Kurno had an artificial lower arm while before, beginning growth in such a state would have led to her immediate recycling. Even a non-combatant needed two hands.

"Your box there...may I see?"

"Yes, you may." Anoris lightly pushed the box across the desk, before rolling the lid back. Inside were a child's toy, a cheap painting sold for public consumption, a few candies, carved metal disks that might have been coins in another society, and some other trinkets.

"So, you like these things?"

"They are interesting to me." Such things were now often sent to him by others, tokens of the outside world. "But I still prefer to live in this place. I would not discard it."

"Is that what you believed Exedore did? Discarded what should have been his rightful place?"

Kurno had asked for this meeting. It wasn't one of those annual interviews designed to evaluate his status, but he ought to have expected her to make such inquiries.

Anoris rubbed at the damaged side of his face. "What, really, is it that you have come here to ask me?"

"Why don't you seem very interested in going outside? Is it because you still fear for your life?"

"Not at all. It is simply that I prefer it here."

"Anoris...you don't have to deliberately take the opposite path from Exedore."

"No. I have admitted many times the similarities between us. But I prefer it here, inside the archives." He gestured to the ceiling. "Isn't this what they wished? For me to work for them in order to find my redemption?" There was a touch of coldness in that last word, he knew. He did not need to be redeemed, and knew they had other reasons for keeping him alive

"A true historian isn't isolated," Kurno said. "You have to learn to interact with the world you've been given."

"I will make it part of my duty. But on the level of sheer leisure, I will not venture out. I jump at no shadows, simply find this outer world...distasteful, rather than fearsome."

"Then you would have preferred Temron's way?"

Anoris sighed and rolled his good eye. She was young, and youths of whatever species seemed to tend to speak in such absolutes. "In some ways, I do feel more relaxed than I could ever have imagined before, but can you understand that this loud world is simply not to my taste? Pity me if it is your inclination, but do not do so within my earshot."

"I...guess my question was childish. You do meet your duties well, and we should acknowledge that." Kurno said after a moment.

_Suppose_? Anoris thought, but he let it pass. Kurno was one of those who seemed to want to treat him in a friendly manner despite his past. "I ought not to be so defensive."

"I know. But you're still adjusting. It will still take a long time, Sir."

"I _am_ also beginning to feel more like I am simply 'Anoris' rather than an Exedore-clone." Though the name of his progenitor was not entirely drained of resonance, still invoked that odd flare of sensation whenever he heard it.

And those flashbacks he'd been having, he had been told, were normal; extracting and preserving memories for eventually importing them from one body to another was still an inexact science, even so long after Zor Prime.

"I enjoy my own segment of the new world. But outside is still disjointed, messy. And there are ways in which both versions triumph over each other, no matter what the preference is.

"Exedore told me something similar, but I do not think he was quite as impartial as he attempted to be. He'd long ago thrown his lot in with the new Zentraedi culture."

Kurno scoffed loudly at his speech, reminding Anoris that there were different levels of respect and power still involved. "_Everyone_ wants to believe that their way is right. It doesn't make us dirt-eaters if we happen to feel the same way as our enemies on that. You do what you wish, Anoris; it's what we allow."

Anoris frowned at what he nonetheless recognized was her teasing, and found himself remembering Murta Hilo again.

She was still imprisoned, he had heard, somewhere where he would never see her. Not that he missed her at all; the records said she had been his "caretaker", and that was certainly correct, but they had barely met directly. Instead, a square hole had been cut between their adjoining rooms, and a hinged door made for it, so that they could speak in a crude approximation of the monitors that were acceptable for inter-gender contact, and she could pass food through the aperture.

Murta could propagandize with the best of the Nuadullians: "They would fear you in that other world, because they are running from history. Seeing you again would remind them of the truth of their existence: that you can never escape what you are. And so they would hate you. But here, we revere you. We love you. You are going to be the key to our victory."

Had he let that play to his vanity? Did he _possess _vanity_? _But there was no sense now in denying that he couldn't have such a thing. No, he...he was not indifferent. He wanted to live like this. He had to learn to trust his own instincts in such a place. He had to act for himself.

***

And then his progenitor came for a visit.

"It hasn't been long."

"No, it hasn't. By necessity."

Exedore drew in a long, slow breath. Anoris saw Lantas glace quickly at him, but she faced Anoris again.

It was near sunset. The two of them were on his desk, both in Tirolian mobile chairs, not because they were severely weakened, but because it was more convenient for their transportation in this world.

"Because I wished to. I don't believe that it erases all that has occurred, but I wished to. It would be pointless to continually pursue the past, when the future is still yet occurring."

Lantas briefly reached between the chairs and ran her white fingers through her consort's equally white hair. Anoris wondered for a moment how she viewed him: as a metaphorical offspring, when they shared no genetic material in common? Or as something more perverse?

She said, "And so did I. I'm part of this." She swallowed. "What have you been doing?"

Anoris gestured vaguely to the contents of his walls. "Archiving, as they asked me. They supply me with information to be stored, and I do so. There are youths who help me, and citizens who despise me." He left the desk as he said it, pausing to turn the lights on as it was darkening rapidly.

"Do you enjoy it?" she asked.

"They ask me that often. I do; I enjoy feeling efficient. But I prefer to stay inside with my work. Except...except for outside. I have come to enjoy the 'natural' world. And I do like investigating the trinkets that all aspects to this world offer. It makes me feel well. So I can now understand and accept, to a slightly better extent, what you made of yourself. But there are some things that I cannot do, including accept this world unreservedly."

"Ah." It was Exedore, this time.

Was that sound he made a nostalgic one? But it was Anoris' turn to ask a question. "How do you feel towards me?"

"Gradually, the sense of obligation has come to dominate. And, I have begun to think that it might have been a good thing to know you, as a friend, after your debts had been paid."

As a friend? Perhaps another would have been angry at the notion, perceiving it as devaluing their genetic tie. But Anoris could still understand why Exedore would only have chosen that; there was nothing strong enough to blind him to that truth.

Lantas' mouth twisted. "May we...stand on your hand?"

Though she asked it tentatively, Anoris recognized that part of her was still repulsed at the idea, and was struggling to fight down that same feeling. And perhaps there was also fear to contend with.

But: "Yes."

Anoris placed the back of his right hand against the desktop, near to the chairs. He waited as the pair of them stepped out. Exedore was also frowning a bit, even as his body trembled and Lantas leaned in to help support him, though after an instant, the elderly Zentraedi had drawn himself up completely straight.

It was doubtful that they had changed their minds and saw themselves as his parents, or forgave him for being a Survivalist. But they walked onto his hand, their small thin forms exerting only the most miniscule of pressures.

Suddenly he realized what this odd gesture meant: it was a sign of trust, for, even weak as he was, Anoris could have crushed Exedore and Lantas in an instant if he so chose. That the two of them were standing there meant something, even if it was not the erasure of everything.

They stepped off his hand and back into their chairs.

"My status in the outside world is still under debate," Anoris said. "But I wish to be your escort into the city." When had that occurred, Anoris still wondered at it.

"Yes, well, thank you. We can't stay long."

----

And indeed, they did not. However, Anoris was not the only one to know of this visit. It would be impossible for it to be so, and Exedore and Lantas were taken through the main streets of the town, their chairs on a metal plate held by the up-stretched arms of two police mecha so that the old ones had a good view of the city's buildings, many with painted and decorated facades, for isolated public art was considered a nuisance.

Anoris followed them on foot, taking note of the variances among the watching citizens. Some crowded close, peering intently forward and trying to get a glimpse of  
Exedore, while others peered out windows with that same eagerness. Yet other areas were empty, or had Zentraedi who took the briefest glimpse before hurrying on.

Anoris asked Exedore, quietly, "Do you feel pride at these sights?" He did not feel angry or challenging towards his predecessor. It was the buildings as much as the adulation of the citizens which could excite such feelings.

"Yes, I do. I know that others participated, then and now, but it is lovely to see this. Part of it is my handiwork."

From the records and journals, Anoris knew that for his progenitor, pride in one's personal accomplishments, in things undertaken solely due to one's own desires, had been a new and exciting thing, centuries ago. Perhaps part of Exedore still remembered what it was like to feel that awe, before giving himself fully over to self-importance.

He could empathize, to an extent. Anoris still belonged to the Zentraedi, but the work was _his_ now, in a sense that defied objective scrutiny, even if there were certainly still ways that the Survivalist world had been better.

The three of them did not speak much further, yet it did indeed feel like something necessary had been settled, even if there were certain things that could not change, but on other levels.

Exedore and Lantas left, escorted by the young Tirolian man they had hired to pilot their shuttle there and help with any physical needs.

Several turned out to watch the shuttle depart, and Anoris was one of them.

"Farewell, Anoris," Exedore said.

"G-Good-bye, A-Anoris," Lantas echoed, falteringly, and her face stretched slowly into a smile.

After they were gone, he then returned to work.

**End.**

**Author's note:**_ I don't generally explain my in-jokes, but "Anoris" was the obfuscating name given to Exedore in the original production of Robotech II: The Sentinels, so that no one outside the staff would mistake the Sentinels production for a Macross sequel. Due to a printing error, "Anoris" is used several times in place of "Exedore" in the summaries in Robotech Art 3._

_Also, I apologize in advance to anyone involved with episode 12 of _Macross Frontier.


End file.
